


Obsidian Hearts

by Scrier



Series: Everything RWBY [2]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Child Abuse, Emotional Hurt, F/F, Found Family, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:14:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28368948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scrier/pseuds/Scrier
Summary: Four years after escaping her personal hell, 17-year-old Cinder returns to Atlas just in time for the Academy entrance exams.All that time on the road under the wing of licensed Huntsman Rhodes Lindos may have taught her to fight Grimm and protect herself against the world around her, but nothing could have prepared Cinder for Atlas Academy, its students, its teachers, and its secrets. Together with her newly assigned team, Cinder will have to face new challenges as well as her own demons if she is to survive and graduate in the city among clouds.[Huntress!Cinder & Snowfall slow-burn AU where Cinder escapes together with Rhodes at age 13 and returns years later to Atlas to become a fully-fledged Huntress]Appropriate tags will be added as we get there.
Relationships: Cinder Fall/Winter Schnee
Series: Everything RWBY [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2017913
Comments: 17
Kudos: 41





	1. Memories I

1

She collected broken glass. It’s a habit.

They didn’t see her do it; most often they didn’t see her at all. She liked it better that way, she thought. How could they hurt her when they didn’t see her? Cinder was careful not to make mistakes. Mistakes were what made you stand out, after all. Mistakes were what made you seen, and mistakes always brought with them the pain.

She kept the stolen pieces hidden away, beside her bed and beneath the floorboards, away from the sisters and not-mother. Cinder knew that they would take it away; punish her, without ever telling her what it was she had done wrong. She no longer searched for reason behind her punishments, she simply understood that they must exist.

Cinder did not know why she kept the pieces, but she did. They kept her company in the dark, watched over her when she shivered against the breeze and the cold that blew through splintered windows. They were her companions in the long nights when hunger and aching limbs refused to let her drift off into sleep.

They were hers and hers alone. 

2

The glass burned in her hands, one night. Cinder hadn’t realized what was happening until she knelt there, alone in the darkness of her not-room, cupping liquid gold in both palms. She knew it should char her hands, burn like that time she had touched the stove when it was still hot — fiercer even, brighter and angrier. But it didn’t.

Instead, a gentle warmth engulfed her hands. It slipped through the gaps between her fingers and fought the night and the cold that came with it. It reminded Cinder of the late-summer sun embracing her as she worked, of a time before this city and the sisters — of a time before not-mother and the punishments. The glass answered. It snaked over her wrists and covered her arms, warmed skin, and sheltered her against the freezing winds. Careful and slow it crept higher, enveloping her like armor some long-forgotten knight might’ve once slain dragons in. The wind still howled, the walls were still cracked, but she paid no mind to either. They no longer mattered.

Cinder had never once understood just how cold she was, not until now, not until she realized what it was to know its absence.

She remembered the night Rhodes had told her about his Semblance, _the weapon of a huntsman_ , he had said, and that one day she too would find her own. Cinder studied the glass wrapped around her hand, even now it gleamed faintly in the darkness. She thought of what would happen if _they_ knew what she could do — what _they_ would do to her if they knew — and the glass answered. The smooth surface transformed, sharp thorns grew over her arms and hands, and in her open palm lay a blade not unlike the one she had stolen so long ago. _The weapon of a huntress._

It would be months before she could meet Rhodes again, but Cinder would practice. She would not squander this gift she had been given. He will return, and when he did he would be proud of what she had accomplished in his absence.

She would become a huntress, it was her way out. Her only way out. She wouldn’t let them take this away from her. Not this too.

3

Rhodes didn’t stay anywhere too long, it was easier that way.

No questions, no name, no one curious enough to dig deeper than the surface. He solved problems and never stuck around long enough to watch the dust settle.

Rhodes didn’t get attached, it was simpler that way.

He hadn’t planned to be back so soon, he wasn’t even meant to be anywhere near Atlas for at least another month. A dozen reports of a particularly nasty horde of Grimm down in Vale should have kept him busy for weeks to come, emphasis on _should have_. He hadn’t so much as set foot on the airship when his Atlas contacts called him right back. The Grimm, as it turned out, didn’t much care for his schedule.

Mantle was falling apart, as was the way of all things broken and forgotten. The transport rolled over patchy streets, dodging potholes and passersby. Factories and houses that barely held together framed the roads on either side, each one giving off the impression that one strong wind was all it would take to bring them crashing down. There weren’t nearly enough huntsmen to go around, and for every hole patched up there were two more breaking down. But, above all else, it were the people that made this city so unmistakably _Mantle_.

There were so many of them. On the streets, the sidewalks, the shops and houses and _everywhere_. Every building seemed to overflow and there wasn’t a spot of open space anywhere in sight. Humans and Faunus and those he couldn’t quite distinguish; a group of children ran screaming and shouting after one another, weaving through the crowd like water. A woman old enough to have fought in the War cumbersomely fought a flight of stairs while pushing past those standing in her way. Crammed trucks brought one shift of workers back from the mines while the replacement crew was already well beyond the city borders and heading underground.

He hadn’t missed the city, he didn’t think anyone was capable of missing a place Mantle, and yet seeing these streets again felt almost like coming home. _Home’s gone_ , said the voice in his head. Rhodes didn’t feel like arguing with himself tonight. How did you argue the truth, anyway?

Another mining crew pulled up and kept pace with them. Rhodes hadn’t meant to look, but did so anyway. They were Faunus, most of them — a crew from deep within the caverns if he were to guess. Huddled together like beggars on a cold night and covered from top to bottom in filth. Rhodes had spent enough time in Mantle to know that these were considered to be the lucky ones, they had found work after all. One of the men shifted, leaving a dark hand-print on the pristine white snowflake printed on the railing. _Better to drudge for SDC than to beg and hunger, right?_

On the tail end of the truck sat a Faunus he might have called a boy under better circumstances pressing a stained rag against what little remained of a woman’s right arm. _Workplace accidents_ were what the medias called them, _generously compensated_ were what the corps said on the radio. The dust companies had no use for broken tools, and sending you home with half a paycheck sounded a lot better to the public than being fired. Rhodes wondered whether she’d find work again before the money ran out. He caught himself staring and fixed his eyes firmly on his boots. His job was to kill Grimm, not get involved in local politics. _Even when the monsters within these wells outweigh the ones without?_

He didn’t look up again until the transport rolled to a stop and a tired, old voice announced that they had arrived at their destination.

Beyond these windows stood a dying city, no matter what the news told you. It wouldn’t die today, or tomorrow, but eventually there would be too many deep cuts and no more band-aids to cobble them back together.

_And who knows? Maybe they’ll simply run out of dust one day; Atlas falls from the sky and Mantle might as well never have existed at all._

4

The _Glass Unicorn_ was deserted. Not surprising, considering that by the time he’d reached the hotel it must have been near midnight, but even the reception lay abandoned. _Strange_.

Rhodes shouldn’t be here, he never stayed anywhere twice, never visited the same restaurant more than once, never slept in the same bed two times in a row. It was a rule, one of the few he managed to keep. Until she happened, anyway. She made him break his rules, one after the other. _You’re seriously gonna blame this on the girl?_

Maybe he’d simply grown soft, a year ago he almost asked her whether she’d come with him. What a ridiculous thought, the girl was barely thirteen. Huntsmen weren’t in the business of stealing children, not to mention all the dangers she’d have to face on the road. Cinder had a bed here, a roof above her head, and a family — perhaps a harsh one, but a family nonetheless. She was safe here, and in the end that was all that mattered. _Why? Because you’ve seen the girl’s eyes? Because they remind you of her?_

He crossed the lobby in quick steps, rang the bell on the counter, and waited. _Just a few more years,_ he told himself. _Cinder would be off to Vale or Vacuo or wherever it was she wants to study. She’d know how to handle herself, she’d be safe._

He could stop coming back.

Rhodes rang the bell again. Nothing. No footsteps, no voices, no sound at all. Metal crept up his neck, an old instinct he had come to trust. _So for whose sake are you doing this, really? Hers, or yours?_ He moved past the reception and toward the door leading toward the back end of the hotel, to the storage room. _Or maybe you’re doing this for Elis after all? Planning to fail Cinder the same way you failed h—_

A scream.

Outside? No. Too close.

From within.

His blood ran cold. Rhodes broke into a sprint.

_Cinder._

5

She hadn’t slept in a day, maybe two. It was hard to tell.

The pain kept her awake most nights. Cramps in her arms, invisible needles burrowing themselves into her hands, burning exhaustion in her legs, daggers stabbing at her throat. That last one wasn’t there —she knew it wasn’t real— but that didn’t make it hurt any less. Still, she reached for her neck and was half surprised when all she found there was cold metal. Every now and again Cinder considered breaking the collar, a few times she very nearly did, but a single thought stopped her every time: _there would be something new, something worse_. Cinder knew that, even when she had a hard time thinking of anything worse. The fantasies of running were usually what followed, dashed as quickly as they came by the simple truth that she had nowhere else to go. Cinder had heard and seen enough of Mantle to know that it was no place of kindness. She might make it out there for a while, perhaps even a few weeks, but eventually her luck would run out. At least in here she didn’t have to face freezing or starving to death, not if she was quick enough to hide the scraps away.

Again she reached for her neck, again she found nothing. Maybe she was simply going crazy, feeling pain where there was none. Most days it ebbed away, eventually, leaving her to drift into dreamless sleep. She was having no such luck tonight.

With a flick of her wrist Cinder called the countless fragments cramped below the floorboards and hidden beneath her not-bed and, as always, the glass answered. It circled her outstretched hand like a swarm of fireflies, flying ever closer together until she couldn’t tell where one shard began and another one ended. Cinder closed her eyes and concentrated, picturing the shape in her mind. Minutes passed, but when she opened her eyes the shards had fused together completely, creating a golden, glowing circle that coiled around her hand like the ring of a faraway planet.

She reached for it — a mistake. No sooner had Cinder moved her hand did the ring drop to the floor and shatter into a thousand broken pieces. Sometimes she thought of that night she had first discovered her Semblance so long ago, of how easy it had been to mold and command the glass wrapped around her arm. It had felt natural, like she had done nothing else her entire life. The way she had felt: the fear and anger and hate, all the things that grew like thorns around her heart. She remembered the weight of the blade, the way the glass had felt indestructible in her hand.

That was the first and last time Cinder had been able to create a weapon — or anything at all — and keep it whole for longer than a few seconds. _Not good enough_. She reached out, and the shards once more began to glow and rise from the floor. Cinder had perhaps a month until Rhodes would return, a month to learn this new power. A month to be what she was that night in the cold. _And you thought you could convince Rhodes to take you with him? Please, you can’t even control your own Semblance! You’re useless to him, just as you’re useless to everyone else._

He would leave again, and she would be stuck here for Brothers knew how long. Another year, perhaps, or even longer. Another year of hunger and pain that was and wasn’t real, another year of punishments from not-mother, another year with the sisters and— _No._

Cinder stood alone in the dark and called out to the glass. She didn’t think of what it was she wanted to create, not really. Instead, she thought of every mistake she had made, of every punishment received and every night spent shivering against the cold. She thought of the only man that ever showed her kindness and all the reasons why she never did tell him all the things they’d done to her.

The shards flared and whirled like a wildfire before her eyes, casting shadows on every wall that danced to the beating of her heart. Slowly the storm transformed into two distinct shapes that hovered motionless in the air, perfect copies of a familiar blade. She reached out, carefully, slowly, afraid that the spell might break the moment she touched them. Her right hand closed around one of the swords, and it held. Featherlight and hard as steel and fitting perfectly into her palm, like they had been made for her hands alone.

This was it, the key she never thought she’d find. Rhodes would see what she could do and realize she was ready to become a huntress, no matter what her _mother_ might have to say. He would take her away, she knew he would.

Something hit the ground behind her. Cinder spun around and almost cut herself on her own blades. The glow from the weapons was enough to make out the far corner of the room, where the sisters stood still as statues and stared at her. They said something, fast and quiet, and Cinder understood nothing but a single, hushed word: _mother._

 _No. No, no, no._ They couldn’t tell her, not now, not when she was so close to freedom. The sisters stepped backward and toward the door, never taking their eyes off Cinder. She would take this away from her, keep her here forever. Pain flared in her neck, she gripped her swords so tighter. _No!_

She reached out.

The glass answered.

And the sisters screamed.

6

Metal enveloped his right shoulder. Rhodes sprinted toward the door and threw his side against the wood, the lock broke as easily as autumn leaves. The hallway was cramped and he couldn’t see much, but he’d been here more than enough times to know exactly where to go. Two left turns later he hurried through an unlocked door beneath a _Staff Only_ sign, here the carefully maintained facade of the _Glass Unicorn_ broke away and was replaced by failing tapestry, creaking floorboards, and storage crates stacked high along the walls.

The corridors here were long and dark, and the containers on either side barely gave Rhodes enough space to move between them — but he knew what would be waiting for him beyond the next door, _who_ would be waiting. He moved faster, elbowing dusty carton boxes out of his way and nearly stumbling over some discarded tool. Not a single other sound had escaped the storeroom since that first scream. Metal coated his arm and claimed his wrist; there wasn’t much worse than silence, the alternative at least reassured that there was someone left to scream.

He tried the door — locked. Three years he’d come here, in three years he hadn’t once found it sealed. He took two steps back and hit the door hard enough to create splinters that would’ve burrowed into his skin were it not for the metal protecting him. Rhodes scanned the room and, for the first time fifteen years, froze.

Cinder, he very nearly didn’t recognize her, stood in its center, the wind howled and blew through a window which had been stripped of all it’s glass, and across the room— _what in the—_

Rhodes remembered the woman who owned the _Glass Unicorn_ and her two daughters, though for a moment he did not understand why they simply stood there like someone had frozen them in place.

And then he did.

Bright collars were spun around their necks, burning bright like open flames. _No, not flames,_ he looked closer, _glass._

Cinder was the first to notice him, she turned around slowly, a slender frame cast in half-shadows of moon- and firelight. One hand always pointed toward the far wall. She didn’t look _at_ him at first, behind him, at the space next to him, as if to make sure he was really there. And then she did something horrible, something that almost made Rhodes want to forget everything he saw: she smiled.

“You’re here… you’re really here. Rhodes. Rhodes, I did it!” she said, again turning toward the sisters. “I found my Semblance, just like you said I would.” Cinder took a step in his direction, and as she did the glass she had woven dimmed to black. Another step. “Now you can t—”

Rhodes had never once heard Cinder scream before, it was the sound of a small death, of an animal forced into a cage — it was the sound Elis had made, the last thing she ever did. What came after was worse.

Electricity sprang from the jeweled necklace he’d never seen Cinder without, it broke her step and forced her on her knees. What followed was instinct; he rushed to her side, ignoring the pain as he touched her and the metal took in the current, glowing hot in the dark.

He was about to say something redundant and altogether dishonest like _It’s going to be alright,_ or _You’ll be fine,_ when he looked up and saw something he would never shake again. There was no fear in the eyes of the woman that stood between her daughters, not anymore. There was _nothing_ there as she stared at the girl screaming on the ground and still pressed down on the remote in her hand, nothing at all but hate. And then, three years too late, he understood. There was no fond sentiment binding Cinder to that necklace, there was a reason he’d never seen her without it. _There was a reason she wanted a way out_.

Rhodes had known that Cinder hadn’t had an easy life here, that she remained last among equals, but this… _why didn’t she tell me?_

 _She suffered because of you, because you didn’t see. Just like Elis._ He realized he was still holding onto Cinder’s arms and loosened his grip. _Had she always been this light, this slim, this tired?_ How much had she gone through because he didn’t see? _Because you didn’t see, or didn’t want to see?_

“No,” Cinder said, whispered, quiet as the wind. “No,” louder, now. She shook Rhodes’ arm off and, against expectations, stood. Unsteady, wavering, but standing. With trembling hands, she reached for the collar around her neck and _pulled_. It snapped; a breaking twig, a twisted bone.

She moved too fast for Rhodes to stop her. Would he have stopped her even if he could?

The windows of the storeroom shattered, their broken pieces swarming the room like insects. In half a heartbeat they were upon the sisters and their mother, wrapping like chains around their necks and hands. The woman who was no mother to Cinder dropped the now useless remote and stared at the girl with pure, terrified surprise. The glass-chains began to glow brighter, like coals in a fireplace. It was her turn to scream.

“Cinder,” Rhodes called out, standing but unmoving. “Cinder look at me.” Rhodes wasn’t sure whether it were seconds or minutes that trickled down the hourglass, but Cinder did turn to face him. “What is a huntress?”

“What?” For but a moment the fury vanished from her eyes, replaced by something best described as complete confusion. Cinder found her balance again, behind her the glass remained bright.

Rhodes took a slow step toward her. “What makes a huntress? I told you once, Cinder, do you remember?”

“A huntress… a huntress is a warrior, a weapon to fight the Grimm.”

Another step. “And what else? What is their duty, above all else?”

Cinder studied her hand, where shards of glass coiled around her fingers like thorns. Snakes wrapped around her shoulder. “They… they’re supposed to protect the people, to preserve life no matter the cost.”

“That’s right, a huntress is more than a weapon or a warrior. She’s a protector, a shield. You don’—”

“They don’t deserve _protection!_ ” Cinder shouted, the thorns on her hand grew as large as daggers. Somewhere someone began to sob. “They deserve what’s coming for them!”

“I know, and Brothers only know I should’ve known sooner. But not like this,” the metal retreated back up his arm and left his jaw. Another step. He was human again. “You have a choice, right now, to be better than them — a choice that is yours alone, that they can’t make you do.”

“What makes them any better than Grimm? Why shouldn’t they pay for what they did to me? Why should I care after _everything_ they did to me?”

“Then don’t do it for them, do it for yourself. This isn’t something you can walk away from, to be responsible for another person’s— you don’t want that weighing on you, Cinder, believe me.” He was close enough to see the unshed tears in her eyes, the shaking of her hands. “You have a choice to be kind, to be something they could never be. To be who I _know_ you can be.”

“I— I don’t—”

“Who are you, Cinder? Please, tell me.”

“I don’t know!” Cinder fell to her knees, tears streaming down her face. “I don’t know,” the glow vanished from her hands, the chains dulled and broke apart. Someone ran out of the room, Rhodes didn’t care. The distance between them was forgotten, he collapsed next to her on the hard floor. Tears soaked his shirt, Rhodes was torn between holding her close and fearing that every time he touched her she might finally shatter.

 _S_ omewhere very far away a clock struck midnight.

 _She suffered because of you,_ there was no malice in these words, it was simply the truth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Formerly "Spellbreaker"] 
> 
> I have feelings about this episode, alright? And it did not help at all that halfway through writing this I kept thinking about a much larger AU in which Cinder ends up at Atlas Academy with Winter, Robyn’s gang, and the Ace Ops.
> 
> Maybe that’s just the Snowfall brainrot talking, for which I blame fan-art, by the way.
> 
> I dunno, is that something people are interested in? If so leave it in the comments. I’d love to hear some thoughts about that.
> 
> Update 23/1/21: The longfic is happening, new chapter on Sunday (tomorrow!)


	2. Peerless

Dinner was served at 18.000 feet above ground.

Solitas passed below, all ice and snow and things that might’ve once been alive but had long since decided that there really wasn’t much here worth living for. Mountains stood lonely and defiant against the frost, the spines of great beasts buried beneath millenia of never ending snowfall. Cinder didn’t much care for heights and, in the interest of keeping the contents of her stomach where they were, focused her attention away from the window-front and back on her plate.

Assortments of skewered meat cluttered their small table — she tasted onions and pomegranate, citrus and red wine, some things she didn’t recognize or simply hadn’t known before. _Atlesian specialty,_ he’d told her and, after some reluctance, _won_ _’t know until you try._ A quartet of broad-shouldered cellists played a slow, quiet song in the corner stage. Four statues cut from flawless marble and moving with effortless precision. Perhaps it was clockwork that stirred beneath their skin instead of flesh and blood. Cinder entertained the thought for a while longer as she ate, fully aware how ridiculous is sounded.

Solitas wasn’t much for hospitality, and after weeks of chasing Grimm through dark caves and oversnowed mountain passes it was nice to end the day with something other than dreary rations and stale water. The air conditioning and a real bed(!) were a welcome change, too.

Across from her Rhodes lifted his glass. Left arm, she noticed, the one that wasn’t busted. “To seventeen years.”

More wine, this one translucent and sweet as peaches. Cinder didn’t drink, not because she didn’t like the taste but for the simple truth that the alcohol made her slow. Speed was one of the few advantages she had over the Grimm and she wasn’t about to hand that one over. Still she lifted her glass and drank, tonight she could allow herself that bit of weakness. Tonight they were celebrating.

It was funny, in the way of politicians and horrible commercials, to sit here now instead of scurrying from table to table collecting orders and insults alike. Four years on the road, and standing on the other side of the fence still felt… off. She half expected someone to come marching out from the kitchen and demand she clean the hardwood tiles beneath their feet. Cinder reached for her throat without meaning to — a habit old and persistent as the rust on the outer hull. Her hand felt the fabric there, smooth and firm and real. Rhodes looked, the way he thought she wouldn’t notice, but didn’t say a word.

“Doesn’t feel like it,” Cinder said and emptied her glass. Too sweet, but not entirely unpleasant. A single night aboard the _Peerless_ , they’d wake to Atlas hovering in the distance come morning. Her future waiting on the horizon, finally within reach.

Rhodes shifted, offering a glimpse of the metal that coated his broken arm beneath his shirt. Too proud for a proper cast, even with a full aura it would take days until he could use it in a proper fight. “You’re not getting nervous on me now, are you?”

“Please, I’d bet most of those brats up in Atlas have never even seen a Grimm outside of the news feeds,” she stretched out her hand palm-up, revealing bracelets made from dozens of crystalline shards. Like snakes they slithered into her palm, only to melt there and be remade. Feathers and spikes took shape, teeth and a scorpion’s tail; wings the size of her index finger beat slowly, claws settled against the skin of her hand. Rhodes watched as the glass Manticore took shape.

Cinder let it walk one, two slow circles across her open palm, then she closed it into a fist and shattered it. “I think I’ll be fine. It’s just Atlas, just another city like any other. We’ve survived worse; nothing there I haven’t seen before, nothing there to worry about.” She hoped he believed those last few words, one of them should.

Rhodes reached for his glass and almost didn’t wince as he put weight on his right arm. “Oh you’ve seen Atlas, but you’ve never seen the Academy, not from the inside.” He opened his mouth, closed it again.

“Something wrong?” Cinder asked.

“You know you don’t have to go back, right? There are Huntsmen Academies all over Remnant — Vale, Mistral, Vacuo.”

“We’ve been over this,”

“I know, all I’m saying is that there are alternatives, places without so much… baggage.”

“I’m not scared of Atlas,” not anymore _._ “I’m ready for this.” _Who are you trying to convince?_ “Besides, I remember rescuing some poor old man from a horde of rampaging Manticores just last week. I think I can handle a classroom.”

He smiled at that. “ _Old man_ , huh? And a _horde_ of Manticores? Maybe you hit your head harder than I thought in that mine over at Prometheus if your memory is that spotty.”

“There were at least ten—.”

“Three.”

“Eight.”

“Five, and that’s counting the dead one.”

“Five, there were five of them and I still managed to get everyone out before the caves collapsed.”

“The caves that collapsed because…?”

They’ve had this conversation before, a broken record that somehow hasn’t cracked yet. “Because,” _I made a stupid mistake._ “Because I got reckless?”

“Because you got reckless,” he turned his attention to the world outside. Night had settled and watercolor strokes of bright greens and blues illuminated the darkened sky. “You’re still trying to prove yourself, whether to me or to yourself I don’t know but you need to learn to control yourself if you want to become a Huntress.”

“But you’re reckless all the time!” Cinder tried to keep her voice down, but they still got a few disgruntled looks from nearby tables.

“There’s a difference between taking a risk and doing something stupid because you have to,” Rhodes’ eyes wandered to his broken arm and Cinder felt a wave of shame wash over here, “and being careless because you want to show off.”

—

A small mining town in the middle of nowhere shouldn’t have been trouble. They only needed to stay the night and would be gone come morning, just how much could go wrong in a few hours?

Prometheus, unsurprisingly, had been a shit show.

The Grimm came after dark and brought the storm with them. A Sabyr pack that must have followed their tracks from the mountains, a colony of Centinels burrowed beneath the caves woken by careless miners and, because the universe just _really_ wasn’t having it that day, a fucking Sphinx drawn in by the fear and chaos.

Cinder could’ve waited, could’ve helped Rhodes get the townspeople inside and to safety, but how many lives could she have saved if she just took the blasted thing out right then and there? So she made for it, cut Sabyrs in half with blades of glass as they leapt for her, sent shards flying that pierced Centinel scales like paper. They’d fought Manticores before, she’d killed Manticores before — so what if this thing was thrice their size, so what if snow and wind obscured the world around her? She could handle this.

The morning sun crept skyward behind the nearest mountain-range, slowly, too slow. The Sphinx was barely visible, black-feathers against the night sky, burning eyes piercing the storm. Cinder let the shards wrapped around her wrists dissolve and took aim. A dozen glass-made arrowheads burned bright and hot in the frozen air, snow fell and turned to rain around her. Most of them missed, landed nowhere near their target and darted past the Sphinx into the night. One struck true, blazing glass cracked plating and burrowed itself into the beast. Another one hit, this time striking its left wing, then a third — the Sphinx roared, spun its head to face her, and dove.

In hindsight, Cinder should’ve run. Cinder should have found cover. Cinder should have done anything except fight an enemy she could barely see in the middle of a Brothers-be-damned blizzard.

Instead, Cinder stood her ground, a crystalline blade brandished in either hand, and watched as the Sphinx rushed toward her.

Watched until it was gone.

Cinder turned, searching, the storm had picked up and she could barely see further than an arms length. It had been right there, how could the Sphinx have just vanish—

A three-taloned claw crashed into her stomach, Cinder tumbled backwards half falling, half stumbling. Her back hit something hard and the world came to a stop. _A wall?_ she must’ve hit one of the small huts scattered near the mine. Still, her Aura held. Good. The last thing Cinder wanted to worry about was how her ribs might’ve looked like if not for her Aura to take the brunt of the force and pain.

She discarded the blades, broke them down into pieces, and made them flare. The snow and ice beneath her began to melt, and the light revealed just enough of her surroundings for Cinder to duck as the Sphinx’s jaw closed around the space her head had just occupied. She rolled, an instinct that saved her as the Sphinx lunged. Crawling backwards through the snow Cinder called the glass toward her.

Not a moment too soon. Rows of dagger-sized teeth threatened to swallow her world, the Sphinx had closed the distance between them in a heartbeat and would’ve bitten her arm clean off if it weren’t for the glass-blade wedged between it’s jaw. It didn’t crumble, not yet. They stood frozen in time, neither risking retreat, neither relenting.

And then the fucking snake bit her arm. Cinder had been so caught up with its claws and teeth, so focused on finding an opening she could exploit, that she forgot about the Sphinx’s tail. A stupid mistake, a novice mistake, a mistake that would get her killed. She felt her Aura ebb away, felt the snake’s teeth burrow into her skin and the cold— Brothers she had forgotten what it felt like to freeze. Her blade would break any moment now, shatter as her Aura collapsed.

There was no time. With the last of her Aura Cinder shattered the sword keeping the Sphinx at bay, made the shards burn bright enough to blind, and sent them flying inward. The Sphinx recoiled as burning glass hit the inside of its jaw, and Cinder’s Aura collapsed. The shards burned out and died, glass fell lifeless to the ground and burned the snow away.

_Now for the painful part._

Cinder reached for one of the shards. She had never before touched her own glass without an Aura to protect her, and she wished she hadn’t done so now. She felt her skin char, felt it blistering as the glass burned in her palm. Still she gripped it tight, even as her other arm hung limb and the snake sunk it’s teeth deeper into her flesh. With what little strength she had left Cinder plunged the shard into the snake-head. She cut through the scales like a scythe through weeds, severing it from the Sphinx’s tail.

The Sphinx roared. Had it already recovered? She couldn’t see it, hidden amidst the storm and the snow. Cinder’s hands were freezing, she couldn’t feel her left arm, all she wanted to do was lie down and— it didn’t matter. She held the shard like she would her sword, for all the good it did her, and braced herself.

It toppled her from behind.

She fell, tumbled, rolled. Still the Sphinx was on her, crushing her below its weight. Her useless arm was pinned beneath it it’s right foreleg, Cinder swung the shard again and again and hit nothing but air. The beast studied her for a moment of torturous indecisiveness, and just as Cinder thought it might have lost interest altogether the Sphinx’s head shot toward her, jaw agape and teeth glinting. Unable to fight her own body she closed her eyes. _What a useless instinct_ , she thought and waited for the end.

It didn’t come.

Cinder opened her eyes, half surprised her body still obeyed any of her commands, and froze for reasons that had nothing to do with the cold. The Sphinx was inches from her face. Unmoving, unblinking, teeth straining against silver limbs.

Rhodes stood between them, a wall of metal and fur-coats, one arm firmly jammed inside the Sphinx’s jaw. “You,” he said, his voice barely carrying over the howling wind, “are in so much trouble when we get out of here.”

 _When_ , she liked the sound of that, right now _when_ felt a whole lot better than _if_. Cinder stood, trembling and aching and freezing, but still she stood. The Sphinx bit down. She watched as the metal began to budge and bend inward, the Sphinx’s teeth pressing plate into flesh. Rhodes didn’t scream, or perhaps the storm simply drowned him out. Still he didn’t move, didn’t pull back. Her thoughts were a swarm of angry insects pressing against the insides of her skull — too many to count, none of them useful, all of them too loud. She had to do something and she had to do it now.

Cinder lifted her arm and burrowed the shard in the Sphinx’s right eye, pressed it deeper only to free it a moment later. Again and again she swung, again and again the glass pierced the Sphinx’s skull until — finally — there was nothing left to offer resistance. The Sphinx vanished into dust, and even the dust was soon carried off by the wind.

Cinder wanted to say something, something witty and clever, something that would get as much distance between herself and _I_ _’m sorry_ as possible, but she didn’t. Couldn’t.

They had a job to do.

—

There’d been yelling after. They’d done that a lot recently.

Cinder knew yelling, she had grown up being yelled at for things she did and didn’t do. When things went wrong it was her fault, the truth didn’t matter much. She hadn’t dared to fight back, then, so that was new. But then again, Rhodes was nothing like _her_ , he never hid what he wanted to say behind cruel sarcasm or mockery. No, when they argued they yelled hammers and crowbars, not knives or hidden blades, and in a way that was worse than anything not-mother had ever said to her.

“It won’t happen again.” Cinder said and meant it, too. If she had to play nice at the Academy so be it, once she graduated there was nothing they could hold over her anymore.

“Good.” he said, and: “Because if I hear you’ve been spending your time in detention I’m going to tell everyone in your classes about the dentist-incident.”

Cinder caught herself smiling. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Watch me, I’m sure I can think of all kinds of embarrassing stories that—”

“Are you blind or stupid, son?!” _What in the_ _—_

Across the room a boy Cinder’s age stood frozen in place, one hand clutching a tray half-filled with cake. The other half lay splattered before him on the floorboards, the nearest table, and — to the loud dismay of its owner — a white coat now showered in chocolate cake and strawberry frosting.

“And deaf, too? Boy, I am talking to you!”

The waiter snapped out of whatever trance he was caught in. “I’m sorry, sir. Terribly, terribly sorry. Please, let me help you.” He put the tray down and tried to get as much cake as possible off the man’s coat, an action that mostly resulted in smearing broad stains into the fabric.

“Get your hands off me. Out of my way!” he pushed his chair back and brushed past the waiter, showing him in the process. The boy toppled several feet backwards and nearly crashed into a nearby table. With a _thud_ that everyone aboard the airship must’ve heard the man marched out of the restaurant, slamming the door shut behind him.

“Cinder.”

“What?” She spun her head around to face him, only to see him staring at—

“Calm down.”

— the fork next to Cinder’s plate that had melted into a bright-red puddle. Cinder unclenched her first, she hadn’t even noticed that her nails were digging white holes into her palm. With a flick of her wrist she returned the fork to it’s original form.

“Why should I? Because we _don_ _’t get involved?_ Because I shouldn’t get upset? Maybe if more people got upset they wouldn’t be pushed around!”

Rhodes set his glass down, he reached halfway across the table before putting his hand down again, as if he had considered touching her but thought better of it. “We’re here to protect these people from the Grimm, not each other. It’s easier that way.”

“Easier for whom?” Cinder pushed her chair back just as a waitress arrived at their table with dessert. She was careful too look anywhere but at him as she said:“I apologize, but I’m afraid I’ve lost my appetite.”

—

It took Cinder fifteen minutes and five flights of stairs to find her room, and when she did she closed the door, locked it, and sacked against the frame.

She wanted to scream, she wanted to shout, she wanted to fight.

Instead, she looked around her room. There wasn’t much to it: a bed, a window, a nightstand, a desk with _huh?_

Cinder had expected the desk — the room in general — to be empty. It wasn’t. Instead there was a single object placed on it, an object wrapped in bright-red wrapping paper tied together with a golden bow.

Pushing herself back on her feet Cinder took a closer look. She picked it up, turned and flipped it, then she found the tag dangling from it. It simply read _Cinder Lindos_ written in awful handwriting she’d recognize anywhere.

Against her better judgment she loosened the bow, ripped the wrapping open, and froze.

It was a jacket. A stupid jacket. A stupid, wonderful jacket.

She ran her hands over the fabric, soft and warm as to withstand the bitter Solitas cold without any of the weight with which a coat might drag her down. Broad strokes of intertwining red and orange in the shape of a flaming bird dominated the back, a stark contrast against the black leather. Her fingers came to a halt at the sleeves, she turned them inside out. Tiny glass beads were woven into the fabric there, enough to create something substantial without ever raising suspicion. Cinder turned the sleeves back, and as she did something fell out from within the jacket and hit the floor.

 _A card?_ Cinder bend down, picked it up, and read:

_A proper Huntress shouldn_ ’ _t find her end freezing to death, don’t you think?_

_Listen, I thought about this too much, so here it goes. I hope you like it._

_I don’t_ _know what’s up next for you or what’s waiting for you in the big city, so I thought something practical might do the trick._

_You’ll_ _show them all what you’re made of, I know that much._

_Atlas has no idea what’s_ _coming for it._

_Happy Birthday, Cinder._

_\- Rhodes Lindos_

Cinder threw the card on the desk and the jacket right after it. She was angry, fine, so what? She worked best when she was angry. Just as soon as she got off this blasted airship. She ran a hand through her hair and caught stray strands that had escaped her ponytail. Her hair was getting too long again, she’d have to cut it soon.

 _Just one more day_ , Cinder told herself. _Just one more day._

Kicking off her shoes she fell onto the bed and groaned into her pillow. The truth was she hadn’t had more than a few hours of sleep every night since… since when? Brothers, she couldn’t even remember. Maybe that was what she needed, sleep.

She lay on her back and watched the lights outside her window swirl across the sky. The _Peerless_ flew onward, unconcerned with the troubles of her passengers.

Eventually, sleep claimed her.

In her dreams she fell, and fell, and fell without burning birds or solid ground to catch her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this was supposed to be up forever ago, but life happened, as life tends to do, so here we are. 
> 
> The names Lindos as well as Elis are inspired respectively by [Chares of Lindos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chares_of_Lindos) and the goddess [Selene](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selene)
> 
> The design on the jacket is based off Lothindil’s [tribal phoenix](https://www.deviantart.com/lothindil/art/tribal-phoenix-305722977)
> 
> I hope everyone had a somewhat pleasant New Year’s despite, well, everything. See you (hopefully) soon!


End file.
